Kevin Gilhooly

Scattered Thoughts

I can’t believe hockey season went longer than basketball season – and they both go on too freakin’ long. Congratulations, Mavericks! Next year, try to close it out sooner.

On to more important sports.

Baseball can make anyone an obsessive-compulsive about statistics. I was in Nashville for a customer meeting, and after my wife mentioned she was late for the AirHogs game, I thought “This is the South. There has to be a baseball game around here somewhere.” So, a couple minutes with Google later, I found the Nashville Sounds – the Milwaukee Brewers’ Triple-A team, and they play a couple of miles from my hotel. As an added bonus, the Round Rock Express was in town, so I could see a Texas team, specifically a Texas Rangers’ team.

Side note – parking $3, ticket $14, beer $6, beef brisket sandwich & fries $7. Total $30. I think that’s under my meal limit.

This was a pitchers’ duel – the Express had three hits but couldn’t score any runs. The Sounds had one hit, but it was a home run, so they won 1-0.

I looked at the stats at the end of the game – Scott Feldman, the Express starting pitcher (on rehab assignment from the Rangers) went 5 innings, walked 2, struck out 5, gave up no hits. He only faced 17 batters and he only threw 73 pitches. (I was surprised he came out, actually.) Derek Hankins came on in relief and faced 7 batters. He didn’t walk anyone, struck out 4, got 2 to ground out (the six outs that made up his two innings of work), and gave up one hit – a home run. 24 pitches, 17 strikes … one over the fence. Beau Jones closed by getting three batters out – two ground-outs, one fly-out. Three up, three down. So, three pitchers, a one-hitter, a 1-0 loss.

For some reason, I’m now just obsessing about this. 4 out of 7 struck out. 57% strike-out rate. 17 strikes out of 24 pitches is 71%. 1 pitch out of 24 is 4%. 96% not bad is usually good, but not in baseball. Almost three-quarters of his pitches were strikes, but he still lost the game.

On the other hand, if three pitchers can limit your opponents to one hit, don’t you think somebody should score them some runs in support?

I am going to try to stop obsessing now.

The other thought wandering around my head lately has been how a team is directed – inward or outward, and does it make a difference to the fans? With the change in managers in Grand Prairie, the team seems much more focused on the game – not that they weren’t focused over the last few years, but it seemed like they were more accessible to the fans. Once the game started, that was it – it was heads down, back to work, but the rest of the time, they either chose to interact with the fans or were directed to do so.

It made being in the Booster Club fun, because the players were always around, and they recognized the booster club members.

This year, they’re off to a great start and they’re kicking the crap out of some of their opponents, but sometimes the fans almost seem to be an afterthought. They are circling the wagons and the team is in the center. While I do think it helps minimize the possible prima donna issues on the team, it means the team is looking inward and not outward.

I assume that a lot of the attitude trickles down from the management – do they see the team as family entertainment playing a game or as a unit that must win all the time? (A related question – is the manager supposed to be a baseball evangelist who draws fans to the park or a general waging war, assuming victory alone produces fans?)

So, a question I’ve been asking myself – Is it preferable to follow an average to above-average team that will acknowledge the fans readily and interact with them when possible or follow a championship quality team that apparently doesn’t know you’re there?

I’m too old to hang with the players or try to keep up with them, so it’s not about socializing for me. There are quite a few players (and a few alumni) who are on Facebook, so I can ask questions and get feedback. A few of the guys will always say “Hi” before the games. It’s just I’ve sensed the overall mood has changed.

I’m not sure I prefer winners who are playing for themselves. I think I would prefer winners that were playing for the fans.

Maybe I’m thinking too much about baseball.

Some questions answered

On the field, the AirHogs look pretty good so far this season. They spent the weekend sweeping the defending champion Shreveport-Bossier Captains, and they are leading their division. So, for those of us worried about teams in the same division with the same owners, maybe it’s not that big an issue, but it’s still early in the season. It’s weird seeing the managers meet at the beginning of the game and realize they work for the same people. It’s a department meeting with the umpires.

From a personnel perspective, as one of the coaches said last night, “We have pitching.” (For some reason, everyone knows that pitching is critical to the game, and yet many teams still have mediocre pitching.)

Winning against Shreveport was a good start to the season (this was the second home stand) although having “Cajun Weekend” while they were here was a bit much for some of us. Our new manager (Ricky VanAsselberg) is their old manager, and he’s from Louisiana, but celebrating the opposing team (even if a coincidence) is just not cool. There are some of us who still remember the stolen base late in a game last year by one of our former players while we were getting blown out, which was a horseshit move. Pete Incaviglia was yelling at Ricky about respecting the game (that move does violate “the unwritten rules”), and now Ricky is our manager, so some of us are still trying to wrap our heads around the whole issue.

Off the field, the AirHogs are still deer in headlights, although it seems to be improving. It’s interesting to see that the new ownership apparently didn’t read any of the agreements made with the season ticket-holders by the old ownership. There are any number of promises made that either were ignored or are just now getting implemented. While I applaud them for trying to make things right, it would have been preferable to just do what the contracts said in the first place.

To me, it’s a bit like the old Van Halen “brown M&Ms” story – if you don’t know your season ticket-holders were promised free drink refills (and have no easy way to provide them), what truly critical part of the team financing or operation did you miss?

I have a feeling the old ownership managed to put quite a bit over on the new owners, and most of that was because the sale process dragged on so long. There were rumors of a sale last year, but the sale went through only a couple of weeks before the season started. In the meantime, the owners bought Pensacola and moved them to Amarillo.

I would love to see a business student do a paper on the team and its history, because they constantly seem to be skating on the edge, and I’m not sure I understand why. (It would make an interesting book, but I think you would find it difficult to get information from the insiders.) If you’re not making enough money, you’re either priced too low or you’re not bringing in enough people (marketing dollars misspent or underspent.) The corporate America solution would be to cut costs – say, pay the players less – but I don’t think that’s possible. So, the challenge should be to get butts in seats. The current solution seems to be discounted tickets (which tends to piss off those of us who paid full price in advance) and the new $40 all-you-can-eat seats in one of the suites. I’m hoping we don’t end up like the Stars and the Cowboys and the Mavericks, where the vastly over-priced seats for people who don’t pay attention to the game finance the team and the cheap seats are empty because eventually they get over-priced as well.

There is certainly competition – there are any number of baseball teams in the Metroplex, so it is a crowded market. However, the AirHogs are in an area that serves a good portion of Dallas and the MidCities – people who are probably unlikely to drive north to Frisco for affiliated ball, don’t want to drive to Ft Worth to see the Cats (same division as the AirHogs) and they’re priced below the Rangers for people who don’t want to pay big-league prices.

So, I’m hoping the new owners get their act together. The field management seems to have done a good job building the team, so now it’s time for the front office to catch up.

Go AirHogs!

Which one is Cinderella?

A bit more rambling on the concept of one company owning three teams in a five-team division … who gets the most attention? Let’s take a quick look at the teams:

Amarillo Sox – no history (new team) but a town that has supported baseball for a long time in the United League. If the previous team had made rent, the Sox wouldn’t be there and Amarillo would be watching a defending champion play. So, good community support to start.

Grand Prairie AirHogs – 2707 average attendance per game last year (above the league average) – dismal start to the second half that may have chased some people away, core fans have probably been concerned about new ownership, team direction, what the players think and so on. Located close to two other minor league teams (Ft Worth Cats, in the same American Association division as the AirHogs, and the Frisco RoughRiders, the AA team for the Texas Rangers) and the Texas Rangers, current AL champs.

Shreveport-Bossier Captains – 1588 average attendance last year but league champions. We’ve been to the ballpark, it’s certainly no QTP.

So, if you own all three, where do you put your money?

You have a new ballclub in a town that already supports baseball. You have an existing ballclub in a crowded market. You have the league champions with low attendance.

My concern as an AirHogs fan is that a market saturated with baseball will fall low on the totem pole even if management lives here. I would think investing in two championship towns with limited entertainment options (do locals really gamble in Shreveport?) would provide a better return.

The AirHogs have a good fan base, the newest stadium of the three teams and a market that is larger than both the others combined. The market size is important for possible spectators, but I think it’s also important as a draw for players. Many of them have mentioned that Dallas-Ft Worth is preferable to many of the smaller markets in the American Association. If you’re going to toil away for low pay, best to have a place to go at night.

The AirHogs also have a lot of concern in the fan base about an ownership change, so the owners need to come press the flesh and assure season ticket holders (especially) that they know how to run a team in Dallas, not just Shreveport, and that the AirHogs will be independent of the rest of the teams in the fold.

Amarillo has a market that is used to baseball and the advantage of the “newness” of the team.

Shreveport has the league champions.

Then, the concern all fans must have – if a company owns three teams and one of them starts making a run at the championship, are the other teams going to “decide” to trade their best players to help the winning team? I know it happens all the time between managers even if the teams don’t have the same ownership, but I’m very concerned that it will be directed from the front office now.

This will be an interesting year.

Sold!

The rumors were finally confirmed this week – the AirHogs have been sold. The new owners are Southern Independent Baseball, LLC. Last year, SIB was the owner of the Shreveport-Bossier Captains. This year, they own the Captains, the AirHogs and the Amarillo Sox (newly moved from Pensacola.) So, one company owns 60% of the Southern Division of the American Association, leaving El Paso and Ft Worth as the other teams.

Frankly, I’m surprised there aren’t rules against this. Of course, El Paso is owned by the company that just sold the AirHogs, so it’s not like it’s new news, but even with independent subsidiaries running each team, there just seems to be a lot of possible conflicts of interest. However, teams are already helping other teams stockpile talent for playoff runs, so I guess this will just make it more efficient.

If you read the bios for the SIB management, they’ve been around independent baseball a lot – owning teams, managing leagues and various other positions.

Independent baseball is a very small pond, I suppose.

So, the front office management is in place. Next, is field management. Then, play ball!

The Joy of Keeping Score

First of all, go find a copy of Paul Dickson’s “The Joy of Keeping Score” and read it. It’s a fun book, even if you never keep score at a game. However, you really should keep score. Here’s my journey.

I got a new phone recently and when I was cleaning all the files off my old phone, I found my scoresheets (well, spreadsheets) from a number of last year’s AirHogs games. I realized it’s time to start practicing on my scoring, because baseball season is upon us.

While some people complain that baseball is too slow (this is a bad thing?), I’ve found the best way to keep my head in the game is to keep score. (It also lessens the cross-talk from the Spousal Unit.) However, since I didn’t grow up in the 1950s, this was not as simple to learn as one would think – as in, my Dad did not just teach me as a part of growing up while we were going to baseball games. Luckily, unlike the 1950s, we have the Internet to find information on anything. For example, here is the official MLB page for keeping score. There is a very useful site with sample scorecards. David Cortesi has a good writeup on Project Scoresheet (RIP.) Google will lead you to hundreds of other examples. If you can find a sporting goods store, they will have scorecards.

Being a geek, I found any number of computer programs to keep score, but really didn’t think taking a laptop to games was a very good idea. Plus, I didn’t relish the thought of tossing an extension cord into the dugout and asking one of the players to plug me in when the battery ran low.

While being a secretive baseball geek, I really didn’t relish the thought of having scoresheets all over the top of the dugout, while trying to keep score the old fashioned way – on paper.

So, I was left with the only computer with batteries that would (probably) last an entire game – my phone. There was some software for WindowsMobile but I didn’t really like any of it.

Then, an epiphany. What is a scoresheet? It’s rows and columns. What is on a computer with rows and columns? A spreadsheet.

The reality is that you can keep score pretty much any way you want – you just need to find a system and stick with it. After all the research I did, and all the systems I tried to learn, one day at QTP, I decided to just do it. So, I opened up a spreadsheet on my phone and started keeping score.

It’s actually pretty easy. Here’s the first inning of the AirHogs vs the Diablos, August 17, 2010. (The AirHogs lost the game.)

Diablos		1
23/CF	Vincent	(Schmidt)Ks
20/2B	Santana	1B
8/SS	Ponce	(CS 20)Ks
30/DH	Nichols
10/1B	Smith
33/3B	Reininger
29/2B	Hulett
24/LF	Reynoso
14/C	Deleo

AirHogs		1
4/CF	Perry	(Ellis)BB
2/2B	Gray	(SB 4 2B E2 4 3B) 1B (4 RBI)
7/SS	Espinosa	(SB 2 2B E2 2 3B) BB
44/3B/C	Porter	pf5
28/1B/3B	Banks	BB
16/DH	Hollimon	1B (2 RBI 7 RBI 28 2B)
27/LF/1B	Stokes	(CS 16)
13/RF	Garza
8/C	Jordan
17/LF	Incaviglia

Daniel Schmidt on the mound for the AirHogs. He struck out the first batter (swinging.) He then gave up a single to Santana, who was caught stealing. He struck out Ponce to end the inning. (Good job, Daniel!)

AirHogs are up against Ellis. Robert Perry walked. Antoin Gray batted second. Perry stole second, and went to third on an error from the catcher. Gray singled to bring him home. 1-0 AirHogs. David Espinosa batted third. Gray stole second and advanced to third on another error. Espinosa walked. Greg Porter popped out foul to the third baseman. Ernie Banks walked. Mike Hollimon singled in two runs and moved Banks to second. 3-0 AirHogs. He then got caught stealing to end the inning.

That’s my system. It’s not as elegant as some, it’s probably too wordy (symboly?), but it works for me – as in, I haven’t looked at that spreadsheet since the night of the game, but I can reconstruct it now.

The reason I need to get warmed up is because I need to go back through the scoresheets from last year and see if my abbreviations were consistent. I have a feeling they varied from time to time.

Still, it’s nice to be able to put a game back together again after seven months.

The other major advantage of having a scorecard is that you can decide arguments after the game. “How many people did Daniel strike out last night?” Look at the spreadsheet. Count the “K”s. “Four.” Done.

So, if you’re at the ballpark this summer, keep score. It’s a great way to stay connected to the action, and it gives you a permanent record of the game.

Also, remember one critical symbol that’s not in any scorecard – “WW”. As Paul Dickson mentions in “The Joy of Keeping Score”, “WW” was Hall of Famer Phil Rizzuto’s notation for “Wasn’t Watching.” You have to go get beer sometime.

Diablos		1
23/CF	Vincent	(Schmidt)Ks
20/2B	Santana	1B
8/SS	Ponce	(CS 20)Ks
30/DH	Nichols
10/1B	Smith
33/3B	Reininger
29/2B	Hulett
24/LF	Reynoso
14/C	Deleo

AirHogs		1
4/CF	Perry	(Ellis)BB
2/2B	Gray	(SB 4 2B E2 4 3B) 1B (4 RBI)
7/SS	Espinosa	(SB 2 2B E2 2 3B) BB
44/3B/C	Porter	pf5
28/1B/3B	Banks	BB
16/DH	Hollimon	1B (2 RBI 7 RBI 28 2B)
27/LF/1B	Stokes	(CS 16)
13/RF	Garza
8/C	Jordan
17/LF	Incaviglia

So glad that’s over

Congratulations to the Green Bay Packers, the winners of the Metroplex’s first Super Bowl. The national anthem sucked, the halftime show really sucked, but the game was actually pretty good – which is how it should be.

I poked around Wikipedia (so double-check the facts), and this was actually the third Super Bowl in Texas – Houston has had two – Super Bowl VIII (Miami’s second consecutive win, the year after the perfect season) and Super Bowl XXXVIII (Patriots over the Panthers.)

Given how incredibly bad many people (including me) think JerryWorld’s halftime show was yesterday, I looked at the halftime shows for the Houston games. 1974? The UT Longhorn Band (which would piss off Aggies, but at least it’s within the State.) 2004? Nipplegate.

I must have zoned out on this, because I never realized Nipplegate was in the Great State of Texas.

So, we didn’t get anyone local (Kelly Clarkson? Willie Nelson? ZZ Top? Jack Ingram? The Robison Boys? Any number of thousands of Texas bands?) and we didn’t get any fun and excitement.

Note to future Super Bowl planners – if you ask a group to do a 15-minute set and they say they need two guest stars to pull it off, get another group.

Super Bowls in your town are a lot like weddings – there is a dull drumbeat that starts a year or two before the event, which grows louder and louder until it eclipses everything else, and then after a few hours, it’s over.(I am very grateful Lotusphere was last week, so I missed much of the hype.)

Was it really worth all the pain?

I’ll wait to see the local financial numbers for a final answer, but I would have to say “No” at this point.

Some of the issues I see:

The home team was from Wisconsin, over 1,000 miles from JerryWorld. As I said on the Bleacher Report yesterday, that’s not really a home team.
Dallas got blamed for having winter weather. In February. May I remind people NYC can’t shovel snow, either, and they get this every freakin’ year?
The weather kept any number of people away, so a lot of stores, bars and restaurants probably have extra stocks today. Anyone having a Jack Daniels sale today?
A number of people with tickets didn’t actually have seats. They weren’t oversold – the seats didn’t exist. It’s not that they paid for outside, standing, watching TV “seats” (who were those idiots?), it’s that the Fire Marshal didn’t approve the temporary seating that was still being installed at game time. WTF?
Jerry didn’t set the Super Bowl attendance record – while it would have been perfect to have the record missed by the exact number of people denied seating, it was missed by more than that.
Wasn’t our last big snowstorm when Jerry had the NBA All-Star Game at the DeathStar? Who did he piss off?

I am probably in the minority on this, but after years of reading about Super Bowls and Olympics that barely break after the locals being promised a huge windfall, I’m really not sure what we got out of this, other than Jerry’s ego is probably larger now than ever, if that were even possible.

I wonder what happened to the guy with two nosebleed seats for $57,000 EACH on StubHub?

Freezing

It’s cold, even though this is Dallas. It’s the dead of winter, and the start of a New Year. However, I think while we have January for the New Year and the Chinese have sometime in February, we should just move New Year’s to Opening Day. That’s when life begins anew, and everyone is tied for first place.

AirHogs opening day is May 12th, 2011 – 7:30pm at QTP, against the Gary SouthShore Railcats – one of the teams added to the league this year.

Substitutes

Why is it that coaches and general managers continue to think having a body around is “good enough” as a backup? The concept that you have a starter who will always play because he’s never going to get hurt is just not valid in the NFL.

When Tony Romo went down with a fractured collarbone last night, Jon Kitna came in to run the team. However, he’s not practiced (Romo runs the first team), he’s not of the same temperament (he’s much older) and he’s not as mobile. How is this a substitute?

A substitute anywhere else in the universe is “something that’s pretty close you use instead of what’s required.” A substitute for the Cowboys is “somebody that doesn’t cost too much.” Oops.

Didn’t we go through this the last time Romo got hurt? We had another elderly QB who I’m sure is good at team leadership but wasn’t very effective on the field.

If you have one of the better quarterbacks in the NFL, you can only afford to have a recycled QB on the bench if your starter is never going to be gone for any length of time. Otherwise, it’s like replacing a Mac with a PC – they’re both computers, but none of your programs work.

This season was pretty much done before last night, but I’m pretty sure it’s over now. Maybe this time (third time’s a charm), the Cowboys will get a backup that is similar, just not as good and not completely different.

Perhaps the problem is the term itself – “substitute” or “second-string” sounds like a lesser quantity. A better term would be “understudy” – someone who knows the role intimately and is ready to take over at a moment’s notice and perform almost as well as the principal without changing any of the parts. Unfortunately, we don’t have an understudy for Tony Romo.

Texas Rangers. AL Champions.

You can all exhale now. Your Texas Rangers knocked out the New York Yankees last night to win the ALCS, 4-2. Now, at last, they can make their first trip to the World Series.

Alex Rodriguez struck out looking for the final out. So much for “going down swinging.” Since he was the beginning of the bankruptcy of the team (morally and fiscally), it seems fitting that he brought a championship to Texas, simply by watching yet another pitch go whistling by. He wasn’t with the Rangers long enough for us to find out he tends to choke in the post season. The Yankees got to find out, instead. Playing to win tends to crush playing for money eventually.

Perhaps, baseball will get a bit more respect around here – for sportscasters who have been reporting constant Cowboys trivia since before training camp opened, maybe it’s time to cover a team that’s winning. I was heartened to see that one of the local Sunday wrap-up shows was almost 50% baseball last week, which is unheard of during the sacred days of football.

Arlington will host a World Series and a Super Bowl within four months of each other. At least the World Series will have a local team playing.

Congratulations to the Rangers players and organization. It’s been a long time coming. There is one less team on the “never been to the World Series” list this morning.

The Texas Rangers. Yes, those Rangers.

So, after tonight, the Texas Rangers have a 3-1 lead over the (dreaded, possibly hated) New York Yankees in the ALCS. Tomorrow’s day game could be the clincher for the series.

Can we finally admit there is a team in Dallas worth watching besides the (dreadful, possibly hated) Cowboys?

Go Rangers!